Total War: MEDIEVAL II 1.5 —The Hotseats & Halberds Update

The Hotseat side of today’s patch sees the asynchronous multiplayer of the desktop version of Kingdoms make its first appearance on mobile in a new and improved form!

And, it’s not just Halberds that are feeling the love… The other half of the update introduces a massive assortment of balance updates to many units — most notably, a new Cohesion mechanic ensuring that Pikemen formations now perform much more reliably.

Read on for the lengthy changescroll:

Unit Rebalancing

Several of the game’s unit types have received a comprehensive balance pass — primarily focusing on the late game — addressing player feedback that these unit types are underpowered.

• The main unit types affected by this patch are Pikemen, Halberdiers, Zweihanders, Gunpowder Infantry and Ribault Artillery.
• There are also changes to the movement speed of late-era ships, and to the defence stats of a few late medieval shieldless knights.
• All of the changes (detailed below) are optional. They will be active by default, but can be disabled via the “Unit Rebalancing” toggle in the Gameplay section of the Options menu. 

The following is a quick summary of which units have had their performance improved:

Pikemen

When a Pikeman was engaged by an enemy at close range, he would drop the pike and switch to a short sword. Once a few men in the unit do this, the hedge of thorns that Pikemen are supposed to present usually collapses.

To address this, a new Cohesion system for Pikemen has been implemented. Before casualties bring the Cohesion level below a certain Threshold , the individual men in that unit will continue to fight with their pikes — trusting in their brothers-in-arms to keep them safe!

Once the unit takes enough casualties to drop below the Threshold, it loses Cohesion and trust breaks, and this ‘every man for himself’ behaviour returns.

The base Cohesion Thresholds (expressed as a percentage tolerance of casualties) of each Pike unit are as follows:

• 10%: Pike Militia, Scots Pike Militia
• 30%: Burgher Pikemen, Flemish Pikemen, Highland Pikemen, Pikemen
• 36%: Heavy Pike Militia
• 40%: Landsknecht Pikemen, Tercio Pikemen
• 48%: Noble Pikemen
• 50%: Aventuros, Swiss Pikemen

There are a few circumstantial, stacking modifiers to pike unit Cohesion Thresholds:

• The Cohesion Threshold is increased when in Guard Mode (+20%).
• Each experience level provides a +3% bonus to Cohesion Threshold.
• The Cohesion of a Pike unit is reduced when flanked (-10%) or attacked from the rear (-20%).
• The Cohesion of Pike units is reduced in forested terrain (-30%).
• The Cohesion of Pike units is also reduced when fighting at night (-15%).
• Pikemen lose Cohesion when fighting on walls (-100%).
• Finally, Pikeman Cohesion is also reduced when fighting a unit with the Cohesion Disruption attribute.
• See the Zweihanders section below for more info.
• The walking speed of most Pike units has been decreased. Historically pike forces, especially those that were not highly trained, tended to be slower than infantrymen armed with less bulky weapons.
• Certain Pike units have been given a new “Aggressive_Pikemen” attribute. These units are exempt from the walking speed penalty, and default to having Guard Mode toggled off. This attribute applies to Aventuros, Highland Pikemen, Landsknecht Pikemen, Noble Pikemen & Swiss Pikemen.
• Fixed a bug where Pikemen behind the first two ranks of a unit do not attack.
• A few Pike units have had small adjustments to their upkeep:
• Pike Militia: increase upkeep cost from 125 to 155 per turn.
• Scots Pike Militia: increase upkeep cost from 125 to 155 per turn.

Halberdiers

The aim of these changes is to make Halberdiers a late-era alternative to spearmen — no less effective against melee cavalry, but more effective against armoured infantry than they have been previously.

• Billmen: increased Defence stat from 3 to 4.
• Bill Militia: increased Defence stat from 1 to 3. Increased upkeep cost from 100 to 125 per turn.
• (European) Halberd Militia: increased Primary Attack stat from 5 to 7 and Secondary Attack stat from 4 to 7. Increased Charge Bonus on both attacks from 2 to 3. Increased Defence stat from 1 to 5. Increased Morale from 3 to 5.
• (Middle Eastern) Halberd Militia: increased Attack stat from 7 to 9. Increased Charge Bonus from 3 to 4. Increased Defence stat from 3 to 7.
• Heavy Billmen: increased Defence stat from 3 to 4.
• Heavy Bill Militia: increased Defence stat from 3 to 4.
• Janissary Heavy Infantry: increased Charge Bonus from 4 to 5. Increased Defence stat from 5 to 9.
• Obudshaer: increased Secondary Attack stat from 8 to 9. Increased Charge Bonus on both attacks from 4 to 5. Increased Defence stat from 4 to 9.
• Swiss Guard: increased Secondary Attack stat from 11 to 12. Increased Charge Bonus on both attacks from 4 to 5. Increased Defence stat from 5 to 10.
• Sword Staff Militia: increased Primary Attack stat from 7 to 8 and Secondary Attack stat from 6 to 9. Increased Defence stat from 3 to 7.
• Transylvanian Peasants: increased Attack stat from 5 to 7. Increased Charge Bonus from 2 to 3. Increased Defence stat from 1 to 3.
• Voulgier: increased Primary Attack stat from 7 to 9 and Secondary Attack stat from 6 to 9. Increased Charge Bonus from 3 to 4. Increased Defence stat from 3 to 7.
• Voulge Militia: increased Primary Attack stat from 5 to 7 and Secondary Attack stat from 4 to 7. Increased Charge Bonus on both Attack stats from 2 to 3. Increased Defence stat from 1 to 5. Increased Morale from 3 to 5.

All Halberd units also received certain behavioural improvements that apply to both the base game and Kingdoms campaigns:

• Added the ability for Halberdiers to brace against cavalry charges when stationary.
• Spear units already had this ability via the “spear” or “light_spear” unit attributes, but these attributes also have the effect of weakening certain values for spearmen when facing infantry.
• The new “Halberdier” unit attribute works the same way as the “spear” attribute, without the weakening effect.
  
• Fixed a bug where the speed of Halberdier units with the Spearwall ability was reduced, even when that ability was not active. This makes it easier to use Halberdiers in their historical battlefield role as nimble support for Pike blocks.
  
• Fixed a bug where individual Spearwall-using Halberdiers outside the spearwall repeatedly stop and start walking when issued a move order.

Zweihanders

Two related unit types fall under this heading: those armed with Daneaxes (or similar two-handed weapons such as Clubs) and those armed with Zweihanders (two-handed swords). Both groups have received the new “cohesion_disruption” attribute, and the latter group have also received bonuses to their combat stats.

• Units with the “cohesion_disruption” attribute reduce the Cohesion of every Pikemen unit they are in melee with, in addition to any other penalties they might impose (e.g. from flanking).
• The penalties applied differ by unit type. This penalty also shrinks in proportion to the Zweihander unit’s remaining headcount
• For example, a unit with a -40% Cohesion Disruption which has lost 50% of its fighters will only inflict a -20% penalty.
• The cohesion disruption penalties by unit type are as follows:
• -15% (Peasant-tier Greataxemen): Clergymen, Mutatawwi'a, Pisan and Genoese Sailors, Religious Fanatics, Woodsmen
• -40% (Most Greataxemen): Berdiche Axemen, Croat Axemen, Eagle Warriors, Earl's Huscarls, Edessan Guard, English Huscarls, Galloglaich, Giltine's Chosen, King Harold, Norse Axemen, Rhyfelwyr, Sami Axemen, Samogitian Axemen, Tabardariyya, Varangian Guard
• -80% (Zweihanders): Alamanoi, Canons of the Holy Sepulchre, D. Gothic Knights, Forlorn Hope, Gotland Footmen, Highland Nobles, Ulster Swordsmen, Zweihanders
  

The following Zweihander units have all been given the armour-piercing property for their melee attacks plus the following statistical adjustments:

• Forlorn Hope: increased Defence stat from 5 to 7.
• D. Gothic Knights: increased armour from 10 to 11 and Defence stat from 4 to 8. Increased morale from 9 to 11.
• Highland Nobles: increased Defence stat from 4 to 6.
• Zweihanders: decreased attack power from 14 to 12. Increased Defence stat from 4 to 5.

Gunpowder Infantry

Arquebusiers and Musketeers both struggle to distinguish themselves against the high-quality Crossbowmen and Archers of the late game. This is primarily because of several issues with their Fire-by-Rank behaviour which severely reduce their rate of fire. The following fixes have been made to remedy this:

• Fire-by-Rank units in Guard Mode will no longer redeploy their lines to directly face targets. They will now simply shoot at any enemy within their firing arc. This allows them to shoot more reliably against moving enemies.
• Units attempting to fire by rank with only 2 ranks no longer countermarch.
• Rank one now simply kneels to reload and stands to fire.
• The rate of fire is modified (to approximately 1 shot every 15 seconds) so that this mode is not much faster than in a deeper formation, but it is very reliable.
• Fixed a bug during countermarching where the front row sidestep would not fully complete before the other ranks started moving, which was causing movement collisions.
• Fixed an unfortunate bug where units in Fire-by-Rank mode could shoot themselves under certain circumstances.
• Relaxed the line-of-sight requirements for Fire-by-Rank Gunpowder units on walls.
• Gunpowder units are now restricted to a maximum of two ranks when manning walls, allowing them to fire at attackers more reliably.
• Improved the rate of fire for all gunpowder units.
• Handgunners, the earliest gunpowder infantry, have been given the “start_not_skirmishing” unit attribute. This better suits their intended role as medium Swordsmen with a supplemental short-range missile attack.

Ribaults

Ribaults have struggled to find a place in the balance, as they have had a far shorter range than full-bore cannons, and fire far fewer shots, more slowly than Arquebus and Musket infantry.

• To improve them, a new “Partial Body Penetration” behaviour has been implemented.
• This allows one Ribault ball to pierce its initial target and hit a few targets behind them — without giving them the unlimited penetration of full-size cannonballs or ballista bolts. This should give them more of a niche in a mixed gun line.

Late-Era Ships

• Implemented a new “efficient_carrier X” attribute. Fleets containing ships with this attribute ignore the X slowest land units or agents carried by that fleet when determining its movement points.
• The value of X stacks if multiple ships in the fleet have that attribute.
• efficient_carrier 1: Caravels
• efficient_carrier 2: Baghlahs & Carracks
• efficient_carrier 3: Grande Carracks
  
• Implemented a new “action_points_mod X” attribute. This attribute multiplies the unit’s movement range by the value of X, with 1.0 indicating no change to their default movement.
• Baghlahs, Caravels, Carracks and Grande Carracks have been given “action_points_mod 1.3“, resulting in a 30% increase in their movement.

Other Units

• Elephants, Elephant Artillery and Elephant Rocketeers have all been given 100% Cohesion Disruption in melee.
• Dismounted Imperial Knights: increased Defence stat from 3 to 4. Increased Morale from 5 to 9.
• Lancers: increased Defence stat from 5 to 6.
• Gothic Knights: increased Armour from 10 to 11. Increased Defence stat from 5 to 6.
• Gendarmes: substantially improved stats to better represent their historical role as the last hurrah of knightly heavy cavalry.
• Changed Mount Type from Mailed Horse to Armoured Horse (unit card changed accordingly).
• Stamina Bonus increased from hardy to very_hardy.
• Lance Attack increased from 10 to 13.
• Sword Attack increased from 11 to 14.
• Defence stat increased from 4 to 6.
• Morale increased from 9 to 11.

Hotseat Campaign Mode

A Hotseat campaign has been added, allowing multiple users to take turns playing a single campaign on one device.

• This feature is available for the Kingdoms campaigns, and, for the first time on mobile, the Grand Campaign of the base game.
  

Additional features and quality-of-life updates streamline the Hotseat experience, including configuration options, alternative victory conditions and Hotseat-specific balance.

• The configuration options can be found during Hotseat Campaign setup under the Hotseat Options submenu. They are as follows:
• Disable Console: when enabled, players will be unable to enter cheats into the cheat console (unless they are logged in as an admin — see below).
• Use Passwords: when enabled each player’s turn will be password protected. Players set the password for their faction at the start of their first turn and must enter that password at the start of each of their turns thereafter.
• Admin Password: enter a password here to enable the “Admin” feature for the campaign. You can then enter the cheat “logon ” followed by this password during a player’s turn to enable cheat use. It will also allow for the use of certain cheats specific to Hotseat campaign administration.
• Battle Playability: Hotseat mode does not support real-time battles with multiple simultaneous players. This offers a choice between:
• Allowing players to play all their battles.
• In battles against another player faction, the AI will control the latter.
• Allowing players to play only battles against non-player factions.
• Requiring all battles to be auto-resolved.
• A new notification has been implemented to let players know when their armies have been attacked on another faction’s turn. This notification details the location of the battle, the General involved, and the result of the battle.

Co-op and Battle Royale Victory Conditions

In the original desktop Hotseat Campaign, the victory conditions used are the same as in single-player campaigns. This mode is also available on mobile via the “Classic” game mode. In addition, two new victory condition types, “Co-op” and “Battle Royale”, have been introduced:

• In Co-op campaigns, the classic victory conditions for all participating player factions are aggregated and their total region counts are pooled. All players win together when this aggregated condition is completed.
• Note: though there’s little advantage to doing so, there is nothing to prevent players from attacking each other during co-op play.
• In Battle Royale campaigns, all normal victory conditions are abandoned. Instead, the campaign will end after a specified turn limit, or when only a certain number of player factions remain. At this point the factions in the campaign will be ranked based on how many “Battle Royale” points they have accrued over the course of the campaign:
• All player factions start the campaign with 10 BR points; all non-rebel factions start with 5 points.
• Every 5 turns, 1 point will be awarded to each faction that scores highest in one of the following metrics:
• Most territories owned.
• Highest total population.
• Most powerful military (land & naval combined).
• Highest treasury balance.
• Greatest production capability.
• No.1 overall.
• In the Grand Campaign only: one more point will be awarded to the controller of Jerusalem.
• One further point will go to every faction that is of the same religion as the faction which controls Jerusalem.
• Whenever a faction captures a territory from a non-rebel faction, they also steal 1 point from the owning faction. Whenever a faction destroys another faction they steal all that faction’s points. Be prepared for sudden turnarounds and betrayals!
• Points can be checked at any time in the Start of Turn notification, or by the line graphs in the Faction Summary.
• To minimise stalemates, an auto-elimination mechanic forms part of the Battle Royale campaign experience.
• If a certain number of turns (configurable during campaign setup) have passed without any faction being spawned or destroyed, the faction with the current lowest population will be destroyed.
• This check includes both player and AI factions, though certain unplayable factions such as the Rebels and Papal states are excluded.

Hotseat-Specific Balance

The Hotseat Campaign mode supports optional split balance:

• This option can be enabled during campaign setup. It modifies construction costs, construction times, agent movement speeds and event dates as follows:


• GRAND CAMPAIGN - COMMON BUILDINGS
• Siege Works: reduces construction time from 5 to 4. Reduces construction cost from 6400 to 4800.
• Cannon Foundry: reduces construction time from 5 to 4. Reduces construction cost from 3200 to 2400.
• Royal Arsenal: reduces construction time from 6 to 4. Reduces construction cost from 6400 to 3200.
• Armourer: reduces construction cost from 2400 to 1800.
• Heavy Armourer: reduces construction time from 5 to 4. Reduces construction cost from 6400 to 2400.
• Master Armourer: reduces construction time from 6 to 4. Reduces construction cost from 10000 to 3000.
• Armour Factory: reduces construction time from 7 to 4. Reduces construction cost from 15000 to 3600.


• GRAND CAMPAIGN - CITY-ONLY BUILDINGS
• Militia Drill Square: reduces construction time from 5 to 4. Reduces construction cost from 4800 to 3600.
• Militia Barracks: reduces construction time from 6 to 4. Reduces construction cost from 9600 to 4800.
• Army Barracks: reduces construction time from 7 to 4. Reduces construction cost from 12000 to 6000.
• Royal Barracks: reduces construction time from 8 to 4. Reduces construction cost from 15000 to 7200.
• Market: reduces construction cost from 1200 to 900.
• Fairground: reduces construction cost from 2400 to 1200.
• Great Market: reduces construction time from 6 to 5. Reduces construction cost from 4800 to 1500.
• Merchants' Quarter: reduces construction time from 7 to 6. Reduces construction cost from 9600 to 1800.
• College of Alchemy: reduces construction cost from 3200 to 2400.
• Renaissance University: reduces construction cost from 6400 to 3200.
• Admiralty: reduces construction cost from 4800 to 2400.
• Great Jama, Huge Cathedral, Huge Orthodox Cathedral: reduces construction time from 6 to 5.
• Bimaristan: reduces construction time from 5 to 4. Reduces construction cost from 6400 to 4800.
• Great Bimaristan: reduces construction time from 7 to 5. Reduces construction cost from 9600 to 6400.
• Printing Press: reduces construction time from 4 to 2. Reduces construction cost from 4800 to 2400.
• Printing House: reduces construction time from 6 to 4. Reduces construction cost from 9600 to 3200.
• Military Academy: reduces construction time from 4 to 2. Reduces construction cost from 4800 to 2400.
• Royal Officer's Academy: reduces construction time from 6 to 3. Reduces construction cost from 9600 to 3600.
• Sultan's Racing Track: reduces construction time from 5 to 4.


• GRAND CAMPAIGN - CASTLE-ONLY BUILDINGS
• Drill Square: reduces construction cost from 2400 to 1800.
• Barracks: reduces construction cost from 4800 to 2400.
• Armoury: reduces construction time from 9600 to 3000. Reduces construction cost from 6 to 4.
• Stables: reduces construction cost from 1200 to 200.
• Knight's Stables: reduces construction cost from 2400 to 400.
• Baron's Stables: reduces construction cost from 4800 to 600.
• Earl's Stables: reduces construction time from 5 to 4. Reduces construction cost from 9600 to 800.
• King's Stables: reduces construction time from 6 to 4. Reduces construction cost from 9600 to 1000.
• Practice Range: reduces construction cost from 2400 to 1800.
• Archery Range: reduces construction cost from 4800 to 2400.
• Marksman's Range: reduces construction time from 5 to 4. Reduces construction cost from 9600 to 3000.
• Caravansary: reduces construction time from 4 to 3.
• Tourney Field: reduces construction time from 4 to 3. Reduces construction cost from 3200 to 1800.


• GRAND CAMPAIGN - AGENTS
• Diplomats & Princesses: increases per-turn movement points from 80 to 200
• Merchants: increases per-turn movement points from 100 to 120.


• GRAND CAMPAIGN - EVENTS
• first_printing_press event: changes trigger turn from turn 187 to 2.
• mongols_invasion_warn event: changes trigger turn range from 64-72 to 60.
• gunpowder_discovered event: change trigger turn range from 105-110 to 75.
• world_is_round event: changes trigger turn range from 160-164 to 90.
• timurids_invasion_warn event: changes trigger turn range from 144-152 to 100.

Bugfixes & Polish

• Fixed a bug where higher Port levels provided additional sea trade routes, but constructing/upgrading Sea Trade port buildings did not. This issue only affected the Grand Campaign and not Kingdoms.
• Fixed an unintended battle control issue where 2-finger camera rotate/zoom inputs would also trigger the 1-finger camera pan effect. Users who prefer the unintended behaviour can re-enable it by disabling the “Modern Camera Rotation ” toggle.
• Fixed a bug where an army could disappear when confirming a previously queued move order into a settlement after another army has been moved out of the same settlement in the same turn.
• Fixed a bug where the Command Slowdown setting was not applying the correct speeds when set to “By Difficulty”.
• Fixed an issue where the cursor would not be hidden when typing with a Bluetooth keyboard.
• Fixed a case where one “do not show again” toggle in one OS prompt didn’t work.
• Fixed the Norwegian General’s Bodyguard in Custom Battles in the Teutonic campaign using the wrong unit card image.
• Fixed a bug where the move_character cheat would not update which region a character is in for the purposes of hiring mercenaries.
• Fixed a few issues where some mouse & keyboard inputs would spoof touch inputs instead of correctly executing inputs from the mouse & keyboard control scheme.
• Fixed certain rare crashes.
• Fixed a few minor issues with cloud syncing.
• Corrected a few strings of in-game text to fix certain minor issues.
• The Feral splash screen has been updated to a newer and more beautiful design.

What’s Next?

We hope you enjoy the improvements introduced in this update. We’re keen to keep improving Total War: MEDIEVAL II on iOS & Android — especially the new Hotseat Campaign mode — so be sure to let us know what you think on our social channels: